August 8, 1922
Twenty-one-year-old Louis Armstrong is riding on a train bound for Chicago, having boarded at the Illinois Central Railroad station in New Orleans. He sits next to a lady with three children. The lady recognizes him, says she knows his mother. This comforts him, not least because she has packed a large basket of fried chicken, enough to last all the way to California in his estimation. Trains in "Galilee" - African-American slang for the South - do not include dining facilities for Negroes, so passengers must bring their own food. His mother bagged a trout sandwich for him, but it feels good to be sitting next to an overflowing basket of chicken. Underneath his long coat and clothes he wears long underwear, even though it is August, and he is lugging a small suitcase in one hand, a little case for his cornet in the other.
-Thomas Brothers, Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism
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